“We wanted to confront the Chinese Embassy on this festival to support the effort in trying to stop this awful thing from continuing to happen.

“This protest has been going on in China and around the world with many celebrities getting involved.

“Several dog meat festivals have already been stopped and a dog meat butcher who has been operating for 50 years was forced to close down.

“Irish people have been horrified by the images that they’ve seen from Yulin and another reason this story is resonating so much with Irish people is that these dogs are trusted companions of other people and are being stolen.”

John Maloney & Molly a Jack Russell both from Crumlin outside the Chinese Embassy in Dublin (Image: Gareth Chaney Collins)

John revealed: “They are taken and thrown into small cages with four or five other dogs and driven from all around China to Yulin.

“We are encouraging as many people as we can to send letters, emails, anything to the Embassy to politely express their distaste at this festival.

“We need people to support us and I honestly believe if they do, we can stop this.”

The Yulin festival started six years ago and up to 10,000 dogs are bred for it every year and while many are stolen and kept in tiny filthy cages with other animals.

From there, they are driven across China to Yulin, before being sliced open, boiled and blow-torched.

Their flesh is then sold as dog and cat meat has been popular in China for hundreds of years.

But it has become increasingly controversial in recent years and has sparked outrage across the world.

In 2011, a dog meat festival in Zhejiang’s Jinghua was shut down after a protest by Chinese campaigners, and in Guangzhou a dog meat restaurant was forced to shut down after more than 50 years in business.

Only a decade ago, dogs were regularly slaughtered on the streets of Beijing’s suburbs but this has been stamped out.